


Rise

by Endlessnotebooks



Series: As I Suffered in Sarajevo [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bosnia, F/M, Gen, Howard Stark's Bad Parenting, Runaway, Sarajevo, Yugoslav Wars (referenced/alluded to), yugoslavia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-14
Updated: 2019-01-04
Packaged: 2019-09-18 06:47:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16990050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Endlessnotebooks/pseuds/Endlessnotebooks
Summary: When she was 15, running away was the best decision she could have made.At 46, returning home is one of the hardest things she will have to face.





	1. Chapter 1

_1986_

The decision to run was as much a decision as breathing. By the time she did it, Toni hadn’t even really been thinking of doing it. She had stashed some money in a bag, bit by bit, starting on her fourteenth birthday and then booked a flight to Austria. From there, she would find her way into Eastern Europe.

They may be under repressive Communist rule behind the Iron Curtain, and she may be giving up a fabulous lifestyle, but her father wouldn’t look for her there. He would hardly even consider that she had been dumb enough to risk crossing the borders. Her only hope was paying off some guards and maybe an official or two so she could hide out in a city away from prying eyes.

Besides, it wasn’t Chernenko she would be living under. If she was very lucky, she could get into Yugoslavia, and she wouldn’t be making herself a target by being the other “Cold War” power’s main weapons designer’s daughter.

A 15 year old girl in Yugoslavia, alone. It was probably some sort of bad film, if she dug deep enough, but it was also 1985 and she had no intention of going back to America.

She would live under a Communist dictator who didn’t give two shits about her existence before she would walk back over the threshold of Howard’s house again.

If someone asked her, though, how she got from Austria to Yugoslavia, she wouldn’t have a good answer for them. She barely remembered anything other than the name she had been given by one of the guards she had to bribe. She was glad she had saved as much as she did to bring – the guards alone had a high asking price.

_Mladenka._

Mladenka was certainly a far stronger name than Antonia.

*

The job barely paid, but the owner was kind enough to let her sleep in the apartment above the café. The apartment wasn’t really used except for storage for the café and the little bit of space she took up. Waitressing and bussing tables wasn’t the worst experience in the world, and she was getting a handle on the language with each passing week.

Or, languages. There were four of them, depending on who you asked. It was mostly the same, with some different slang - and the Bosnians liked to add some Arabic sayings into their speech. Her regulars were kind though, even if there were a few that got their kicks out of ribbing the new girl and hazing her a tad.

The regulars, though, were the people she could absolutely kiss. They knew she wasn’t Yugoslavian – she didn’t have the accent down right, even if she could speak more than a few phrases now – but they always smiled and greeted her, the older ones calling her as they did their own daughters.

Running had been the best choice of her life. Choosing where to stop, though, could just about beat it.

Sometimes it was hard to believe she had lived in Sarajevo almost an entire year.

*

_2016_

Toni is nothing if not immaculate and focused. As much as Natasha had dropped the ball on the psych eval – and yeah, she could admit she had messed up on that one – she knew the things she left out to protect the woman in front of her are just as important to how they are going to get their people back.

So seeing Tony, her eyes on the wall in front of her but her mind clearly not there, is disconcerting to say the least.

“Are you okay?” Natasha notices the phone in Toni’s hand. Toni takes a minute before she responds.

“I need to go to Bosnia.”

Toni is on her feet and out the door before Natasha can as a question, so she does as she feels she’s been doing for weeks – she follows.


	2. Chapter 2

_1985_

The only thing running through Howard Stark’s mind when his daughter turned up missing was that his legacy would be tarnished if he didn’t either find her or have another child.

His efforts to find her were spoiled by the fact that she had been careful. Nowhere was there even a single word about her planned escape – and it had to have been planned, given how absolute it was.

It didn’t even occur to him that this was his only daughter, that this was the same girl who used to sneak into his office and try to surprise him when Maria wanted her to bring him down for dinner. It didn’t occur to him that this was the girl whose brilliance was going to outshine his, and how was that for karmic irony? Not only being outshone by his own kid, but by his daughter no less. Must be penance, he sometimes thought, for having secretly thought so little of Peggy during the war.

But, as always, it was Peggy, the fiercest woman he knew, that reminded him of what had been lost.

“She was your daughter. And until recently she would have kissed Chernenko to make you happy. She would have done anything to get your approval, and then _you hit her._ ”

“She was mouthing off!”

“That’s not the point, Howard! Do you know what happened that night, after your drinking got so bad you weren’t aware of the couch you passed out on, much less the people around you? Your daughter called _me_. She called me, and she _begged_ for me to steal her away and hide her from you.

“That girl is stronger than any man I’ve ever met, and she begged. You brought a woman of iron to her _knees_ , Howard. And she was your own daughter!

“If worrying about your legacy is how you respond to her disappearance, then maybe she was right. Maybe I should have hidden her all those months ago.” Peggy shook her head. “As it is, when we find her I assure you, you won’t be notified without her express permission.”

*

_1986_

The three boys at the table had come in irregularly at first, but then Daris, the owner of the café, had told them her schedule.

Now they were in at least once a week, usually more. They would order coffee and try to chat with her while she worked. It didn’t usually get much from her, unless it was a slow day, but it was something fun to do.

Daris knew she was young – young enough that some had asked her if she had thought about working on some of the youth work action projects – but he looked the other way. She needed work, and he needed a worker. It was an arrangement both were happy with.

“Mladenka, Mladenka!” One of the boys, a taller one, sang out. He had a violin case at his feet that had seen better days (even the violin had seen better days), but his smile and stature took up so much space in the small café it was hard not to notice and smile back.

“Luka, Luka!” She swept her rag across the table she had just cleared, leaving it to sit while she got their orders.

“One coffee, my love.”

“How can I be your love if you never speak to me.”

“But I do!”

“You sing my name, and you shout for coffee.”

“That’s not true! Sometimes I shout for tea or water!”

“Only when the coffee rations have run out.”

He rolled his eyes. “Well aren’t we speaking now?”

“Now, he says!” Toni rolled her eyes, feeling herself settle just that little bit more. She was Mladenka. She had left Toni behind. “Yes, we are talking now, now that I’ve told you we never do!”

Arman laughed, pushing Luka’s shoulder. “Do you have coffee?”

Mladenka laughed at the two of them. “Of course we do. This country practically runs on it – we are never out for long.”

“We run out of coffee and the Croats will riot!” The third boy was a Serb by the name of Nikica. Luka rolled his eyes and shoved him, scowling playfully.

“You say that like Mladenka isn’t a Croat!”

“With that name? You bet she’s a Serb.”

Arman laughed – he had a deep laugh. The kind of laugh that warmed a room. The kind of laugh that was almost tangible. “She’s a Bosnian – her hair is too long and soft to be a Serb’s.”

“Maybe I’m foreign.” She tweaked an eyebrow, taunting them just a bit. It was an easy trick Aleksandr, one of the guards, had given her – pretend to joke about being foreign and you looked more patriotic. It was reverse psychology at its finest.

“No way. You’re too beautiful to be a foreign girl.”

Aleksandr had been right about that. Pretending got her far. He was the one that had set her up with the job in Sarajevo, had gotten her fake documents. He had given her advice on staying under the radar and keeping down her job, the first thing of which had been “list yourself as older than you are.”

She had been about to list herself as fifteen when he had said it. She was glad, now, that he had. A fifteen-year-old showing up abroad the same week she disappeared would have hit Howard’s radar – there wasn’t much the man didn’t know – and this would keep her out from under his thumb.

“Too beautiful, he says.” Mladenka shakes her head, throwing the towel over her shoulder and pointing at Luka as she walks back behind the counter. “You, sir, are too forward. One day, a woman will take you up on all this flirting, and then where will you be?”

She felt older than she was. She felt more whole.

It scared her, though.

Sometimes she forgot she was Toni. Here, she was only Mladenka, and that was so liberating as to blur the lines between the façade and reality.

And worse? Sometimes she didn’t mind.

*

_2016_

Toni leads Natasha to an old café, bursting in the doors without really thinking about it. Suddenly, Toni is speaking a quick Serbian, shouting for someone, as far as Natasha can tell. She didn’t learn a lot of Serbian – only what was necessary in 1998, when she had to lure a mark to bed and slit his throat.

Instead of trying to follow the conversation, she looks at the walls of the café. Old pictures dot the walls, many of which have Toni and three men a few years older.

The most striking thing about Toni in each of the photos, though, isn’t her age – though it is shocking to see Toni so vibrant and young. When she reappeared on the scene of the world at nearly 30, there was something harder in her eyes than Natasha had ever been comfortable admitting. What was striking about the photos was the smile.

Toni’s smile in almost every single photo was wide, a grin at the start of what was sure to be a bubbling laugh.

Natasha had never seen Toni smile like that. She had never heard her truly laugh.

“Mladenka…”

Toni shushes the man, not paying attention. She spouts off something in Serbian that sounds like it has to do with visiting a dying man, but Natasha can’t be too sure.

Again, Natasha follows Toni out the door without a question.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel it's worth mentioning that there will be an exploration of the rise of nationalism, as this story is leading up to another one that is going to detail some of what happened during the Bosnian Civil War 1992-1995. While I don't intend to put any outright hate speech in this, the tensions and the nationalistic ideas that may appear throughout the story are meant to feed the atmosphere that will spill over in to the conflict that eventually took place. If this idea bothers you - while I will put beginning notes at the head of more graphic or more serious chapters, I advise you to be cautious. 
> 
> Again, there will be no outright hate speech, but violence and nationalism will be a not insignificant part of this story and some of its sequels.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A very late Christmas chapter. I don't know much about Eastern Orthodox Christianity so if I got anything wrong (all my information comes from online.

_1986, December_

Mladenka had picked up on the tensions between her three closest friends fairly quickly, but she tried to push it aside, to ignore it.

As the winter holiday approached, though, there was little to help ease tensions. The religious differences were starting to come out in subtle and barbed comments. And maybe that was why she did it. She was nominally Catholic, much like Luka was, and remembered times as a child (until Howard had said otherwise) that she had gone to Mass with her mother, but she hoped that pulling this stunt would help them forget for a moment the differences that were starting to come out more and more often.

She had cleared out the kitchen of the tiny apartment – not noticing as she did that Daris was helping by removing some boxes of old records and bills to be moved down to the building’s basement, or the bookshelf he brought up to put his old books on. She had cooked some food from their respective cultural groups by going to their mothers on her off-time and getting recipes and saving for three weeks to buy all the things she needed to (though she had to skimp on some things – the rations were getting stricter with Winter right around the corner).

Arman wasn’t Christian, but he was always a sucker for some free food, and she figured even if she was defaulting to the Catholic date that Nikica would appreciate the gesture.

And she was right. Arman was more than happy with the food, Nikica appreciated having someone drag him out for some sort of Christmas food, and Luka was more than happy to indulge a few more Catholic traditions.

The food wasn’t what she had grown up eating, either, but she enjoyed it. Family favorite from the three people that had come to mean the most to her.

Daris had come up as well, bringing his own dish and a camera.

The ‘family photo’ stood proud on her wall for a long time.

_2016_

The hospital they walked into had mismatched brickwork, and it fascinated Natasha. There was no rhyme or reason to why it would look so different in some areas of the wall.

Then it hit her.

The 90s had been a busy time in Russia. As the USSR fell, the Black Widow graduates were called on more and more for political assassinations to make sure the old guard could gain power again. It was one of her many shames, her hand in clearing the way for Vladimir Putin, but it was what it was at this point. She couldn’t change it.

But as busy as she had been in Russia, she had still caught wind of the wars happening in Yugoslavia at the time. The brutality between the different groups had been part of the historical records that SHIELD made her read when she joined. Photos, witness accounts. All of it translated into English and Russian.

And those photos… The ages Toni was would line up to the wars.

And they were in Sarajevo.

Toni didn’t so much as blink at the walls, or at the less-than-stellar conditions. It was almost like she had expected them.

Natasha followed her into a room, surprised to see a man about five years older than Toni laying on the hospital bed and arguing with a nurse.

“Sasha!” Toni scolded him, ostensibly in Serbian or Croatian after that. Natasha, once again, felt lost in the new language.

*

Toni wrapped her arms around Aleksandr, continuing to scold him for arguing with the nurse.

“I was told you almost died!”

“Ah, Mladenka, you worry too much!” Aleksandr waved a hand in her direction. “You didn’t need to come all this way!”

“You collapsed on the street with heart problems, and you say I didn’t need to come here?” She fought the urge to fuss over him, knowing there was someone else in the room. She couldn’t help it, though. Aleksandr had done a lot to look out for her, even after their initial meeting. He was like a brother, and she couldn’t imagine hearing he had died and she was thousands of miles away, not having seen him face-to-face for several years.

Aleksandr laughed, but it was a more sober laugh. “Have you seen Luka, yet?”

“No, but I’ll see him soon. While I’m here, I promise.”

“Who’s your friend?”

“Nat?” Toni turned. She switched to English, just in case. “Natasha, this is Aleksandr. He’s a dear friend of mine.”

Natasha nodded, walking forward.

*

_Early 1987_

Aleksandr showed up at the café carrying a small bag. “You are doing well! I hear from the patrons that you are good at the language, now!”

“I can talk about Tito and coffee – I feel like that’s about all you need in any language.”

“Clearly you can talk about more than that, otherwise Daris would’ve sat you down and forced you to learn faster.

“Come to think of it, I could do it while I’m on leave.”

Aleksandr was a military man through-and-through in that he was laser focused, strong as nails, and took an order well, but he wasn’t like the ones she had met at home. There wasn’t that performative patriotism that led to violent speech and harsh rhetoric. He had told pieces of his story in their letters, and it helped her put together an image of who he was. He had joined up at seventeen, a few weeks after Tito died. He didn’t do it out of some grand feeling of obligation or out of a desire to do well by himself – he was worried about the stability of Yugoslavia and sought to help. He didn’t plan to stay in the military longer than necessary, and if it came down to it Mladenka had no doubts he would absolutely leave behind Yugoslavia and the military behind for a quiet life.

Mladenka walked behind the counter, smirking at him as she poured him a coffee. One of the few people that Daris liked well enough to promise free coffee too was Aleksandr, and he had been clear with her that it was in no small part because he had dragged her to the café. She had become one of his most dedicated employees, and that he didn’t have to pay as much because part of her work went to room and board helped him keep the café afloat while making sure there was always someone else on hand.

Aleksandr was quick to drink it down, putting down his mug and smiling. “Ah, that is the best coffee can get, I swear.”

“Arman’s family makes a good cup of coffee.”

“Arman?” Aleksandr raised an eyebrow. “That’s a name I forgot about. How are those boys doing?”

“Oh Nikica is still a jerk now and then, but they get along fine. They like to tone down the worst of it around me, but they forget that this is a small café – I can hear them just about anywhere I stand.”

“Well that’s still sweet of them.” Aleksandr shrugged, pushing the bag towards her. “Something special came in a few days ago, and they passed it out to most of my unit. I got a little extra to bring to you.”

It was chocolates. Good chocolates, too. There was a store down the road that sold some, but unless she had a serious craving or her period was particularly bad, it wasn’t really worth it.

“Oh, Alexey, I can’t take this.”

“Too late. They’re yours now.”

Mladenka smiled at him, filling his coffee up. “How long are you in town for?”

“A few days. Is your couch as hateful and mean as ever?”

“I tried to fix the issue with that spring, but I don’t think it’s mendable. Your back may just have to suffer a few nights on it, unless the floor is more appealing.”

He shook his head. “I’ll take the couch over a cold floor any day.”

_2016_

When they left the hospital, Toni led Natasha back to the café. “That man means more than nearly anyone else to me.”

“What?”

“There are few people that I have unreservedly put my trust in. Aleksandr is one of them.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because I think the Red Room tried to beat kindness and trust out of you, but I don’t think you would be here if you didn’t still have some of it in you.

“I don’t know how easily I’ll be able to trust you again, but I’m willing to put in the effort if you are.”


End file.
